The Battle of Tannenberg and Masurian Lakes

The battle of Tannenberg and Masurian Lakes proved to be very important battles. Both General Paul Von Hindenburg and Erich Ludendorff were instrumental in the battle to which they were touted the name “heroes of Tannenberg”. The plan was for the French and British armies to hold the German armies in the west as the Russian armies which were much larger than the Germans could organize themselves. The German commander positioned six of his divisions behind the Angerapp River west of Gumbinnen leaving a two division and a regular division near Allenstein to protect the slow advancing divisions of the Russian armies. Advanced elements clashed at Stalluponen on August 17 after which Pritwitz attacked with his three main corps at Gumbinnen three days later simultaneously. This caused much loss to the Russian army which lead to them retreating.

This would lead to the battle of Tannenberg. The Russians lack of good quality railroad networking seemed to really go against them. This aside from the fact that their trains operated on different rail gauging than the Germans. Prittwitz decided to take advantage of the lateness of Samsonov’s advance meaning the German forces could face the Russian forces separately as opposed to singly which is what Russia planned on in the first case. The German train lines dispatched three corps south to meet Samsonov leaving only Calvary and Landwehr to the west of Gumbinnen. The second army’s remaining five corps had inadequate supply lines back to Poland and virtually no communication between their other armies.

The Battle of the Masurian Lakes was another German offensive attack this time it was located in the eastern front. This battle again pushed the Russian army back this time significantly backwards. Although the tenth Russian army showed hampering further progress from Germany. This battle although another success for Germany was not as successful as Tannenberg where The...